'They laughed at Galileo. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown.'
The platypus is remembered because it was one of the many hoaxes which turned out to be real; the OP even lists a whole bunch of hoaxes and fakes!
Similarly for the comment about rogue waves: are giant waves really that improbable? Now, how about giant ship-sized sea snakes? (What do they eat? Why haven't we gotten any real samples of their bodies, when they aren't even abyssal creatures? Why has the rate of discovery of sea-going reptiles been zero for decades when human populations, scientific research, travel, and sensor technology have all been increasing exponentially?)
The OP links a short statistical analysis of discovery rates: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/182368464/2008-woodley.p... What struck me was not that the most reasonable analysis, the logistic regression, estimates zero species remaining to be found, but the authors' list of lame discoveries in 'cryptozoology': stuff like moths, peccaries, and whatnot. Really? Really? That's your defense for the plausibility of giant sea snakes - moths and small land mammals in extremely remote locations?
The platypus is remembered because it was one of the many hoaxes which turned out to be real; the OP even lists a whole bunch of hoaxes and fakes!
Similarly for the comment about rogue waves: are giant waves really that improbable? Now, how about giant ship-sized sea snakes? (What do they eat? Why haven't we gotten any real samples of their bodies, when they aren't even abyssal creatures? Why has the rate of discovery of sea-going reptiles been zero for decades when human populations, scientific research, travel, and sensor technology have all been increasing exponentially?)
The OP links a short statistical analysis of discovery rates: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/182368464/2008-woodley.p... What struck me was not that the most reasonable analysis, the logistic regression, estimates zero species remaining to be found, but the authors' list of lame discoveries in 'cryptozoology': stuff like moths, peccaries, and whatnot. Really? Really? That's your defense for the plausibility of giant sea snakes - moths and small land mammals in extremely remote locations?